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Hi I'm Rick

I am a husband, a father and a grandfather. My grandfather is Shawnee and was born on a reserve in Canada. I am a Mormon.

About Me

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I love being with family, the outdoors, traveling and making new friends. Every Sunday evening after Church all of our children and grandchildren come to the house for dinner and to spend time together. With eighteen of us that can be a full house, but the joy of being together is immeasurable.

Why I am a Mormon

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As a boy I grew up in the Methodist Church. I loved attending church and especially taking communion. I read the Bible and prayed, but after service as a Marine in Vietnam I withdrew from activity in church and took another path. Two brothers who were boyhood friends awoke one Saturday morning with a powerful impression that the Lord wanted them to share the gospel with someone in our hometown 950 miles away. They quit their jobs and traveled together to contact their childhood friends in search of the one the Lord had prepared. I was the least likely candidate, living a lifestyle incompatible with membership in any church. After two weeks of searching and with no employment they were discouraged and prepared to return home. The last Sunday in town they invited me to attend church with them for a testimony meeting. An elderly Sister sitting behind me bore testimony of the Savior and His gospel and how the younger generation sought happiness where they would only find emptiness, like in a dream when you are thirsty and drink but when you awake you are still thirsty. Something she said sunk deep into my soul and I was spiritually thirsting. I went home and picked up a Book of Mormon I had received the previous month. I began reading from the book and I wanted to know more than anything in the world if it was true. I knelt by my bed and prayed through the night. The experience that followed confirmed to me the certainty that God lives and is our Father; that His Son Jesus Christ lives and loves us and that He is our Savior and Redeemer. I was baptized the following weekend. I know that the Book of Mormon is true and that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the Lord’s true Church restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith and that Jesus Christ is at the head of the Church. I know that we have living prophets and apostles as did Christ’s early Church and that Thomas S. Monson is a true prophet, just as those he has succeeded and those who will follow.

How I live my faith

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I have been blessed to serve as a member of the Stake Presidency and as bishop and branch president of four different congregations. Outside of family, life’s sweetest experiences have been with those whose lives have changed as they entered the waters of baptism or returned to activity in the Church and began a new life, changed through the power of the atonement of Jesus Christ. To accompany them on their journey to the temple and to be with them there is to experience a joy that defies description. For that reason my wife and I will be leaving home and our beloved family in January to serve as senior missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Our family shares our excitement about this new phase of our lives.

What will the Mormon missionaries talk about when they visit my home?

Rick

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The missionaries share a message of God's love for his children in all ages and regardless of their nationality, race, gender or other differences. They teach that our Father in Heaven loves us much that He sent His Son to show us the way to return to Him and that Jesus made it possible by overcoming both sin and death through His infinite atonement and resurrection. They teach how through faith in Jesus Christ and sincere repentance (a real change of heart) we can be cleansed from sin through baptism and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. They also teach about the eternal nature of family and how families begun on earth can continue in the eternities and how we can find joy in this life and eternal life in the world to come.Show moreShow less

Mormons believe Jesus Christ is their Savior. Why do we need a Savior?

Rick

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Sin separates us from our Father in Heaven because no unclean thing can enter into His presence. As Paul taught we have all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. To be reconciled to our Father in Heaven justice requires payment of the price for our sins, or our separation from him. Mercy cannot rob justice therefore someone must pay the price. Jesus paid that price in Gethsemane and Calvary when he took upon himself the penalty for our sins and suffering so that we might not suffer if we repent and come unto Him. Without His merciful atonement we we would be forever separated from Him and our Father in Heaven thus He is our Savior and our Redeemer.Show moreShow less

Since a new star first appeared above Bethlehem, Christmas has been a season of light, reminding us that Jesus Christ is the light of the world. Together, we can celebrate His birth by making the world a brighter place.

This biologist uses the scientific method every day in his professional life, but in his personal life, Kevin Livingstone relies on a different set of tools for answering big questions about life on earth.